


The first time Noiz felt real desire (and a good dose of hope with it)

by DragonReine



Series: A Series of Firsts [2]
Category: DRAMAtical Murder - All Media Types
Genre: Anime Canon Compliant, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Past Abuse, M/M, Post-Anime, Unresolved Sexual Tension, kounoi, noijaku
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-31
Updated: 2014-10-31
Packaged: 2018-02-23 08:37:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2541314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonReine/pseuds/DragonReine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Noiz and Koujaku trade information about their respective pasts, and Noiz decides to make a leap of faith (so to speak).</p><p>Based in Episode 12 of the DRAMAtical Murder anime.</p><blockquote>
  <p>Koujaku stared at him for a long moment, his face remarkably impassive, given how animated he usually was. Noiz felt it again–that odd sizzling tingle down his spine at being the sole focus of Koujaku’s attention. He’d felt it each and every time he’d managed to draw Koujaku’s attention towards him, and it felt like the anticipatory crackle he felt when he was about to step onto a Rhyme field.</p>
</blockquote><strong>EDIT:</strong> Updated with an illustration!
            </blockquote>





	The first time Noiz felt real desire (and a good dose of hope with it)

**Author's Note:**

> Self-beta'ed, all mistakes are my own.

Noiz had never actually realised how humid Midorijima was.

Logically, he knew that Midorijima would be humid, since it was an island, with all the expected weather one associated with islands. But Noiz had never actually  _felt_  that before, not until Aoba had Scrapped him, and they’d left the artificial atmosphere of Platinum Jail behind.

It didn’t occur to him that he would start noticing the weather, of all the things.

Which brought up another problem; Noiz was starting to feel a little too hot. A novel sensation, being able to feel the warmth of the air, but it also made him aware just how thick his clothes were. Granted, he had always worn thicker clothing on purpose, as light protection against bumps and scrapes, as well as a handy excuse for whenever people brushed against him and he couldn’t feel it.

He’d taken off his beanie because it was felt like a heat-trapping helmet on his head, and he could feel the heavy wool of the inner layer of his clothing sticking to his skin. Noiz was actually tempted to just strip down to his underwear, except that he was sitting in Aoba’s room, and the idea of taking that liberty here just felt…wrong.

Noiz looked up from his perusal of diagnostics screens to stare at Aoba, deeply asleep on his bed. They were somehow able to return to Aoba’s home without much trouble, despite the chaos of the Oval Tower’s collapse and the resulting failure of all of Platinum Jail’s systems. Aoba had been clutching Ren to his chest and crying like his heart had been ripped in two, before eventually passing out in an exhausted slumber. Noiz had no idea what exactly had prompted that reaction, but if it was significant enough to make Aoba, who had one of the strongest hearts Noiz had ever known, to act like that…

It made Noiz feel  _uneasy_.

Hence the diagnostics he was running on Ren. He doubted Aoba would mind, and Noiz suspected that it would be a bad idea to wake Aoba just to ask for permission, given the emotional state he was in. Noiz was simply going to take a look, and maybe fix any errors he found. Hardly anything that would damage Ren.

Except none of what he was looking at made sense to him.

Noiz studied the lines of code and the various results his scans had shown. It would be safe to say that the blue Pomeranian Allmate in sleep mode in front of wasn’t the Ren that Noiz knew. In fact, Noiz was very sure that this wasn’t Ren at all.

Something–or someone–had completely ripped out the AI personality that was ‘Ren’ out of the Allmate’s chips. Noiz doubted that it could function more as a display model, now, without any of the data needed to run even the most basic of Artificial Intelligence software.

It disturbed Noiz greatly, since Ren’s code was completely unconventional to the point of being illogical; even he had a hard time making sense of how it seemed to be _inserted_ between the lines of code for basic Allmate functionality, and Noiz had utter confidence in his ability to decipher software. For someone to not only be able to identify Ren’s code, but to remove it entirely without leaving any spare coding errors or any other “footprint” of Ren’s existence…that would require a lot of knowledge that Noiz didn’t have.

Noiz wasn’t sure if he should be afraid of them, or admire them.

Sighing, he closed the screens and leaned back, resting his weight on his hands. No point in investigating any further. Ren was gone in every sense of the word, and Noiz had no way of figuring out how to even bring him back. Noiz installed a simple ‘blank’ personality just in case Aoba might want to use it still, but the probability of it ever developing into something similar to Ren was virtually nil.

Aoba’s reaction made sense, of a sort. Noiz still couldn’t figure out why Aoba was so attached to Ren, but he supposed that Aoba’s reaction was normal for a person who had lost something they cared about. Noiz had seen various forms of that reaction before, although Aoba’s was on the more extreme end of it.

Ugh. He wanted to just…go home, maybe, and do something far more productive than sitting around ‘watching’ Aoba. But Tae had been very adamant that someone would keep an eye on her grandson while she took Clear to someone that (so she claimed) would be able to repair something as complex as one of Toue’s prototype Alpha models. Hardware repair wasn’t one of Noiz’s better skillsets, so he left her to it, but it did mean that he was one of the two left behind who had to stay with Aoba.

As for the other guy…

Noiz looked out at the balcony outside, where Koujaku leaned against the railing, watching God-knows-what and smoking a cigarette, wispy curls of smoke drifting around him. Before this, Koujaku had spent the longest time sitting on the bed by Aoba’s side, staring down at Aoba with an inscrutable expression on his face. Eventually, he had reached out, lightly picking up a lock of Aoba’s hair, rubbing strands between thumb and forefinger, before he got up and went outside, where he’d been ever since.

Seeing Koujaku reminded Noiz of the wound on his scalp, which reminded him that it was starting to itch. The heat didn’t help at all. He clenched his fingers in an attempt to curb the urge to scratch at it.

Noiz had thought he had the old man all figured out. But it turned out that he was wrong on a large number of things.

It only made some of Koujaku’s recent behaviour back at Platinum Jail even more puzzling.

And Noiz disliked being wrong, but he hated having an unsolved puzzle even more.

Feeling more than a little annoyed, Noiz got up, unclipping one of Usagimodoki’s cubes from his belt and switching it on.

"Monitor’s Aoba’s physical condition," he instructed once the cube made an inquiring beep. "If he wakes up, or displays any symptoms that might indicate additional discomfort or distress, notify me."

"Pi! Roger! Monitoring Aoba, pi! Scanning for baseline vitals!"

Satisfied that Usagimodoki would do its job, Noiz placed the cube down beside Aoba’s head, and then turned towards the balcony.

Koujaku scarcely reacted when Noiz joined him outside, only turned his head slightly to peer at Noiz out of the corner of his eye. “Ah. I thought you would have gone home by now.”

Noiz shrugged. “I thought of it,” he said, but didn’t bother elaborating. Let the other man come to his own conclusions; it wasn’t like Noiz owed him any explanation.

Koujaku simply grunted and went back to staring out at nothing in particular. It was an uncharacteristically mellow reaction towards Noiz, which puzzled him even more.

Noiz studied Koujaku’s face in profile. Noiz wasn’t the sort to usually notice how good-looking a person was; the world was a pointless, senseless existence back then, and everyone looked the same, as far as he was concerned, because he simply didn’t care. When he  _had_  to pay attention, Noiz usually only took note the specific details of a person’s appearance far more than the overall picture, since clients usually consider “X has large dark eyes with heavy eyelids and a mouth that had a full lower lip” more useful than “X looked like they could be a runway model”.

But if he had to judge Koujaku’s appearance in terms of aesthetic appeal, Noiz supposed that the old man might be considered ‘good-looking’. All of his features were set evenly, none of them overwhelming the rest, and he had a symmetrical face. There’s also the myriad of people that swoon over Koujaku to consider, and Noiz supposed that they, at least in this, could be used as decent proof for Koujaku’s attractiveness.

"I don’t understand you."

The words were out before Noiz could think of holding them back, and he wanted to bite his tongue off.  _Damn it._

"Huh?" Koujaku turned to look at Noiz fully, a slight wrinkle between his brows. "What’s that?"

Ah, whatever. Noiz already said it, might as well just forge on as if he had said that on purpose. “Oh, didn’t you hear that properly? Has your hearing gotten worse, old man?”

Koujaku’s eyes narrowed. “I heard you perfectly the first time, brat. What exactly do you mean by you ‘don’t understand’ me?”

Noiz shrugged and leaned back on the railing, a reverse version of Koujaku’s pose. “None of what I know about your past fits or explains your current behaviour. I don’t understand it.”

Koujaku raised an eyebrow, and a thin smile curved his lips. “Oh? This I have to hear. What do you know about my past?”

_Trying to call my bluff, huh?_

Except that Noiz wasn’t bluffing. He kept tabs on all of the major players in Midorijima’s power structure, and Koujaku, being the leader of a well-known Rib team and a known friend of Dry Juice’s leader, was definitely one of them. His mental (and digital) folder on Koujaku had enough dirt in it that it could do plenty of irreversible damage to Koujaku’s carefully-maintained reputation.

Whatever. If Koujaku didn’t like what Noiz had to say, that was his problem.

"You’re the heir of a prominent yakuza family on the mainland, the illegitimate son of the head’s mistress. He recalled you and your mother from Midorijima in order to groom you for the role, since the head’s official wife was barren. You learned a lot of your fighting skills then, and leadership skills as well. Your father brought in a well-known tattoo artist named Ryuuhou, who just so happens to have less-well-known affiliations with Toue, and got that man to give you your tattoos. After the tattoos were finished, you went berserk, and killed almost everyone in the clan compound at the time, including your father and your mother. You went under the radar for a while, and I presume you learned your hairdressing skills during that time, after which you came back here to Midorijima, started your own gang of do-gooders for what I assume is an act of atonement." Noiz raised his eyebrow. "That’s the short version. I’ll admit I was sceptical when I first looked into it. Just change the names and you’d have a script for a serial drama."

Koujaku’s smile had faded away the instant Noiz mentioned ‘yakuza’, and he had steadily grown paler while Noiz went on. By the end of it, he was white as a sheet, and shaking just ever so slightly.

Noiz smirked. “Well? Do you need to hear more?”

The sheer fire in Koujaku’s glare when the old man got angry never failed to get Noiz’s blood pumping. He half-expected Koujaku to throw a punch, but then Koujaku sucked in a breath, letting it out slowly, and Noiz could visibly see Koujaku push his anger away.

"I’m not sure if I should deck you for being a total and utter creep, or for being a total and utter asshole," Koujaku muttered. He took a drag of his cigarette and tilted his head back while blowing out a fine stream of smoke. "But I suppose I should have expected that, given your line of work."

Noiz stared, disconcerted by how casual Koujaku suddenly was. “You’re not angry?”

"Don’t let my face fool you. I am extremely  _pissed-off_ ,” Koujaku said, his tone light, and he smiled as he straightened up from his relaxed slouch over the railing. “However, I won’t hurt you for throwing that in my face. I might have even deserved it, since I goaded you into revealing what you know. And you haven’t explained why you think my behaviour doesn’t fit my past.”

Noiz glared at him. “Shouldn’t that be for you to explain?”

"Well, I thought since you already knew so much about me, I should know why you think you can judge me based on that. In the spirit of fairness, of course."

The venom in Koujaku’s voice was unmistakable, even as the tone of his words remained sickly sweet. It was almost funny; Noiz would bet that a good majority of Koujaku’s fans, if not all of them, had never seen just how vicious their darling Rib leader can get.

Unfortunately, that bit of data was irrelevant to the puzzle Noiz was trying to solve.

"You’re a murderer," Noiz said bluntly, and saw Koujaku flinch as if he was physically punched. "Yet ever since you’ve returned to Midorijima, you’ve been acting like the stereotypical do-gooder, and I thought that you did it so you could avoid being suspected of your crimes. Except it isn’t just an act; you actually are as soft-hearted as you seem, despite how impossible it sounds. But that only makes your actions in the past even more puzzling.” Noiz pushed himself off the railing, and turned to face Koujaku squarely. “I want to know what exactly set you off on a killing spree, and I suspect that the tattoo artist I mentioned had something to do with it."

Koujaku stared at him for a long moment, his face remarkably impassive, given how animated he usually was. Noiz felt it again–that odd sizzling tingle down his spine at being the sole focus of Koujaku’s attention. He’d felt it each and every time he’d managed to draw Koujaku’s attention towards him, and it felt like the anticipatory crackle he felt when he was about to step onto a Rhyme field.

Except this time, it also brought back memories of  _other_  sensations. Koujaku’s hands holding him up by the hips, firm and effortlessly strong.  Koujaku’s mouth moving slow and unhurried over his in a lingering kiss, lips and tongue stealing Noiz’s breath away with the  _wet-hot_  intimacy of it. The brush of thumbs across Noiz’s cheeks, shocking him with the fact that he could  _feel_ just how light and gentle they were as they drew circles over his skin. The sharp jolt of arousal from feeling the hot brand of Koujaku’s erect dick along his ass, and the answering ache in his own cock.

It had been a heady, terrifying thing, just being able to actually experience all of that, so much that he had panicked at first, too overwhelmed by everything. But if that was how people felt just by kissing, no wonder so many go completely nuts over getting to have sex.

Noiz was already thinking of ways to get Koujaku to kiss him again.

Not right now, though. Right now Noiz wanted  _data_ , information, and he was willing to put that on hold in order to get the answers he was looking for.

So he only met Koujaku’s piercing gaze, and waited patiently. He figured that, since the old man had not denied him outright, this was simply Koujaku trying to gauge his reaction.

People rarely give up their secrets so easily, and whatever drove Koujaku to slaughter an entire compound of people had to be a pretty dark and dangerous secret indeed. 

After a long moment that seemed to stretch on forever, Koujaku let out a sigh and dropped his gaze. “Fine. I’ll tell you about Ryuuhou, and what he did to me.” He took a long, final drag from his cigarette, and then dropped it on the ground, putting it out with a grind of his foot. “But only if you explain something about yourself to me.”

Noiz frowned. It was an unexpectedly shrewd move, to offer a trade of information instead of telling Noiz outright. But Noiz won’t make a deal based on a condition as vague as that. “What do you want to know?”

There were a pretty large number of questions that he had anticipated Koujaku would ask.

What he did  _not_  anticipate Koujaku would do was step forward, raise his hand, and flick a finger against Noiz’s forehead.

It  _stung_.

Noiz flinched back. “What the fuck?” he snapped, raising his own hand to rub at the sore spot. “What the hell was that for?”

Koujaku sighed. “An answer to a question.” He tilted his head. “You couldn’t feel pain before, could you?”

Noiz froze.

“I’ve been thinking on some things that you’d said,” Koujaku went on, “and some of the things you’d done. I thought that you barely reacting when I head-butted you was just you hiding your weakness. But you really can’t feel any pain, huh? That’s why you said that you’ve never felt a headache before. Because you didn’t know pain, so you can’t tell how it’s like for yourself.”

Noiz stared at Koujaku, his mind whirling with shock and amazement. This guy managed to piece together something Noiz thought he had hidden well, despite the fact that there were only a few days’ worth of interaction between them. Noiz had known people that had worked with him for  _months_  but never noticed it.

Or never cared about it enough to ask.

Koujaku gave him an odd smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “I’m right, aren’t I?”

Noiz felt his lips twitch, and then he laughed, amused despite himself. “Maybe there’s a working brain behind that pretty face after all,” he said wryly, just to see Koujaku’s eyes narrow with annoyance. “Well, you’re  _half_  right. It isn’t just pain; I couldn’t feel anything at all, before.”

Koujaku’s eyebrows rose up, his eyes going round. “Really?”

Noiz nodded and started removing the bandages from his hand. “Really. It’s like there’s a really thick layer of rubber over my skin. If you hit me back then, I can only just barely feel the pressure. He raised his bared hand, showing Koujaku the healing burn. “See this? This felt like nothing to me.”

Koujaku stared at his hand for a long moment. His expression was weird, like a scowl but not quite, his eyes and brows too soft for it to be a true frown; it made something in Noiz’s chest squeeze tight, making it hard to breathe, but warm at the same time. It was both comforting and uncomfortable. “Is that why you didn’t care what happened to you, before?” Koujaku eventually asked. “Because you felt nothing, so you didn’t care any damage done to you?”

Noiz snorted and gave Koujaku a hard stare. “I was a  _monster,_  unable to feel any pain, so I didn’t care if I hurt others, because I didn’t know what it was like to feel pain. My parents hated me enough to keep me locked in a room for most of my life–”

"They  _what?_ ”

Koujaku spoke with that snarling, rage-filled voice, like when Noiz told him about the Ribsters. Noiz should be worried, but he couldn’t find the room to be; his own chest  _hurt_ , breaths coming too quickly, heart pounding too hard, but the words just kept tumbling out of his mouth, and it was impossible to stop them. 

“–so I thought, since no one cared, why should I care for myself? And everywhere I went, all I see are people who cared about what I can do for them, but never cared about  _me._  So I stopped caring about what other people think. I was alone and trapped in my own broken body, and I stopped caring about that too.” He closed his eyes and swallowed past the sudden lump in his throat. “Wouldn’t you feel the same, if that lack of feeling was all you knew your whole life, and you couldn’t do anything about it?”

He didn’t hear Koujaku move, so it took him completely by surprise when arms suddenly wrapped around him, pulling him chest-to-chest against a solid body. At first Noiz only stood there, too startled to respond, but then he let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding and let himself cling back, his own arms curling around Koujaku, his hands clutching at bright red fabric.

Koujaku said nothing, only held him tighter still, for which Noiz was grateful; it meant Noiz could just press his cheek against Koujaku’s shoulder, close his eyes, and  _feel_.

When Koujaku had hugged him the first time, Noiz had thought that he would feel trapped to be held like that. But instead he’d felt… _safe_. It was like being surrounded by a warm glow of light, nothing like the cold black walls of loneliness that had trapped him before.

Noiz didn’t want to let go.

He felt Koujaku’s chest expand with a deep inhale, and then deflate as a warm breath sighed past his ear. He could also feel Koujaku tense up, just ever so slightly.

“What do you know about Ryuuhou?”

Noiz frowned at Koujaku’s question, pulling up his mental database and seeing what he had. “…Not much. Famous, well-travelled, in demand by a lot of yakuza for his skills. Boring stuff, at first glance, except for the Toue connection, but only because he was seen speaking with Toue at various social events.”

“Ah.” Koujaku fell silent again for a moment, before speaking again. “The tattoos on my body, I’m sure you’ve noticed them…I don’t know what methods Ryuuhou used, but they aren’t normal tattoos. When I lose control, when I get  _angry_ , they take over me, and I forget myself. All I could think about when I lose my mind like that was to destroy. To  _kill_ ,” he nearly spat out. “That’s what happened at the compound. Ryuuhou was a cruel, sadistic bastard. He made sure that the tattoos hurt as much as possible while he inked them, and I had to endure it, or my father, the head, would hurt my mother even more. She was suffering, and I thought, if I allowed Ryuuhou to tattoo me and let my father groom me to be the heir he wanted, I would be able to protect her. But I was young and in pain and so  _angry_  at everything, and when the tattoos were done, I just…I lost it. When I woke up, I had a blade in my hands, covered in blood, and everyone was dead or dying. My mother…” Koujaku’s voice hitched. “She died in front of me. She died  _because_  of me. I wanted to be her protector, and instead I became the monster that killed her.”

The hug had become tight enough to be almost painful. Noiz wasn’t sure when exactly it had happened, but what started out as a gesture from Koujaku to comfort Noiz had turned into Koujaku seeking comfort  _from_  Noiz.

It was a weird feeling. Not a bad one, exactly. Just very weird.

Noiz spread his hands on Koujaku’s back and stroked gently, feeling awkward about it. It had eased the painfully cold edges in his own chest when Koujaku did it to him, back in Platinum Jail. Perhaps it would do the same for Koujaku. 

He wondered how many people knew about this, aside from maybe Aoba. 

He wondered how lonely Koujaku must feel, having to hide such a major part of his life away from others.

"…Thank you"

Koujaku let out a huff of breath. “What for?”

 _For trusting me with your story._  “For being honest.”

Koujaku snorted. “What a weird thing to thank me for. I did say that I’d tell you, didn't I?” Koujaku pulled back, so they were face to face again. He was frowning, looking displeased about something. “Are you okay, though? You’re sweating a lot.”

_…sweating?_

Noiz abruptly realised that the back of his neck felt damp, as did his hairline. And the back of his clothes felt like they were sticking a little more to his skin than before. He reached up, touched his nose, and his fingers came away slightly shiny with moisture. “Huh.”

Koujaku clicked his tongue. “I don’t understand why you’d wear so many layers in this weather. It’s like you’re asking for a heatstroke.”

"At least I'm dressed sensibly and not showing off my cleavage like a brazen hussy," Noiz retorted.

Koujaku went red in the face and spluttered. “ _Showing off my—?_  I’ll have you know that at least my clothes are suitable for the weather, unlike yours.”

Noiz shrugged. “Didn't care. Couldn't feel anything, remember? The heat wasn't a problem before.” Noiz took out his handkerchief and wiped his face with it, getting rid of some of the uncomfortable clamminess. He would need to modify his clothes, now that he can feel. No point in putting on too-warm clothing when they’d lost their protective purpose. 

It was when Noiz was refolding the handkerchief that he realised Koujaku had gone weirdly silent. He glanced up, and saw that Koujaku was staring at him wide-eyed, a hand rubbing over his twitching mouth. 

…was he trying not to smile?

Noiz frowned. “What’s with that look on your face?”

Koujaku made a very odd strangled noise before dropping his hand. He was definitely smiling now, eyes crinkling at the corners. “Ah. Forgive me. It’s just that I didn’t expect you to carry something like a handkerchief. It’s a bit old-fashioned, isn’t it?”

Noiz glared at him as he shoved the square of linen unceremoniously back in its usual pocket. “It’s a habit. Shut up.”

Koujaku laughed, raising his hands up. “No, no, I’m not trying to mock you. It’s just surprising, is all. It’s actually kind of cute that you have a habit like that.”

Noiz narrowed his eyes. “…Am not cute.”

"Not for you to judge," Koujaku said airily. He placed one of his hands on top of Noiz’s head and ruffled his hair. 

Noiz let it happen, not entirely sure how to react. He thought that he would be offended by the seemingly condescending gesture, but Koujaku was still smiling, his eyes filled with warm mirth, with none of the bite Noiz had expected. The fingers shifting through his hair were gentle, making Noiz’s scalp tingle.

What a strange, wondrous thing, that a hand capable of being this kind was also capable of such deadly violence. Granted, the slaughter in Koujaku’s past was a result of mind control—Noiz couldn’t help shuddering at the memory of having his own mind ripped from him when he heard that strange music in Platinum Jail—but even then, Koujaku was a Rib leader, and Rib wasn’t a game for pacifists. Yet here Koujaku was, being kind and gentle with Noiz, despite having no reason to be so.

Noiz never imagined that there would be people like Aoba and Koujaku in this world, people who choose to be kind simply for its own sake, without needing to be compensated or rewarded for it.

It didn’t mean that Noiz couldn’t find a way to repay them, however.

But first…

Noiz reached up, grabbed the tassel hanging from the front of Koujaku’s neck brace, and reeled the other man towards him. Koujaku yelped at the sudden pull, which meant his mouth was open when Noiz leaned up and fitted their mouths together.

Noiz snaked his tongue in, tasting the ashy bitterness of Koujaku’s cigarette, but then the old man pulled back and away before Noiz could do more. He tightened his grip on the tassel, not letting Koujaku move too far away.

“What—” There was a light flush on Koujaku’s cheeks, and he had grabbed Noiz’s wrist for some reason. “What are you doing?”

Noiz frowned. “Kissing you.”

“I get that,” Koujaku hissed; he’d lowered his voice to a whisper. “But why—? ”

Noiz’s eyes narrowed. “You said you didn’t want to ignore what happened between us, back in Platinum Jail.”

“I said we needed to  _talk_  about it!”  

“What is there to talk about?” Noiz asked flatly. “I want you, and you want me, or did you forget how you got hard for me the first time?”

Koujaku turned even redder. “Did you really have to be that vulgar?”

“Yes,” Noiz replied, making Koujaku scowl even more fiercely. “Don’t deny that it happened, I’m not that stupid.”

“I’m not  _denying_ —damn it, Noiz, I told you before; I don’t want to take advantage of you!”

Koujaku didn’t actually shout, but he might as well had, with the way his words rung between them.

“Seriously?” Noiz stared at Koujaku. “ _That’s_  your problem?  _After_  you’ve asked me to kiss you once?”

Koujaku turned his head down and away, staring at some point on the ground, but Noiz did not miss the grimace on Koujaku’s face before it was hidden by his fringe. “Noiz, I just…you were treated badly before, and it’s obvious that not enough people have shown you kindness, which is an unfair thing, but I don’t…” He sighed out a breath and spoke, in a voice barely above a whisper, “You deserve a lot better than someone like me.”

Noiz stared hard at Koujaku as the words sank in and swirled around in his head, at the same time something hard and cold and sharp congealed in his chest.

Noiz wondered if this was what true anger felt like.

“Oy.” He gripped Koujaku’s jaw firmly and turned his head. Koujaku allowed it, but his eyes were still averted, and he kept his head bowed down.

Noiz gritted his teeth so hard that he felt the ache in them. “ _Koujaku_.”

That did the trick; Koujaku’s head snapped up, his eyes widening. An expression of shock. An unsurprising reaction to Noiz; this was the first time he had probably called Koujaku by name.

“Look at me.” Noiz stared hard into Koujaku’s eyes. “Look at my face. Do I look _scared?_  Do I look  _unsure_  to you?”

Koujaku blinked. “…No. But—”

“ _Listen_ , you idiot. I. Want. You. Is that so hard to understand? Maybe I’m young to you, but that does not mean you can act  _patronizing_  to me and assume I can’t think for myself.” He saw Koujaku flinch as the verbal jab sank home. Stupid old man. Did he really give Noiz that little credit? “Tell me honestly; do you want  _me?_ ”  

Something pained flickered in Koujaku’s eyes. “I do.”

“Then stop making things more complicated than they are.” Noiz leaned in again, until their lips were just a hair’s breadth apart. “Don’t use me to feed your own guilt.”

Koujaku’s breath hitched, but Noiz closed the last distance between them, and kissed him.

Hard. Ravenous.  _Hungry._

If words weren’t enough, then Noiz would show Koujaku with actions as well.

He let go of Koujaku’s face, wound his arms around the taller man’s torso. He pulled Koujaku in closer as he thrust his tongue back into Koujaku’s mouth.

Koujaku made a breathless groan, and Noiz felt him respond as if he was helpless to it, and it made relief swim through Noiz; some part of him had been afraid that Koujaku would reject him. It was exhilarating to feel that Koujaku was just as desperate as he, meeting Noiz’s mouth eagerly with his own, turning that ever present spark between them into stormy passion. Strong hands dropped to Noiz’s hips and gripped, just hard enough to be on the edge of painful, and it was like a sharp jolt of  _yesgood_  electricity straight to Noiz’s dick.

Noiz could definitely see the appeal of having sex, now. Not that they were actually going to  _have sex_  right there and then, but it didn’t mean they couldn’t have a little  _fun_.

Noiz shifted closer to Koujaku, until they were pressed together from chest to hips, while he skated his hands, slow and deliberate, down Koujaku’s back, and closed them possessively over his ass.

Noiz broke the kiss, parted their hungry mouths just enough to hear Koujaku let out a startled, hissing inhale of breath as Noiz eased his hands, then closed them again and started kneading.

Just enough to hear Koujaku let out a half-moan, half-sob when Noiz ground his hipbone against the bulge in Koujaku’s jeans, while he rubbed his own hardened dick against the muscle of Koujaku’s thigh.

 _Fuck_.

Noiz dove back into the kiss, reclaimed Koujaku’s mouth, swallowing the near-whimpers. He never thought Koujaku would sound so sexy, so wanton; it made Noiz’s hair stand on end and his mind go fuzzy with static. He wanted to hear more of those sounds, wanted to see if he can make Koujaku scream.

More than that, however, he wanted  _Koujaku_.

The taste of his mouth, dark and bitter and yet sweetly-intoxicating. The spicy scent of the cologne he wore mixed with his own natural musk. The heated, muscular weight of him, and the restrained strength Noiz could feel with every caress of Koujaku’s hands on his body.

Noiz wanted everything.

Except Koujaku was gripping his shoulder, pushing him back, breaking the kiss. Noiz snarled and struggled, but Koujaku very firmly held him back. Koujaku was flushed, panting for breath, his eyes darkened with lust, but—

“Oh my god, why did you  _stop?_ ” he snapped, irritated.

Koujaku’s eyebrows shot up, and then he let out an explosive laugh. “Speak Japanese, brat,” he said. “I don’t know what you just said.”

Noiz blinked at him.

…wait. Did he seriously just blurt that question out in German?

The shock must have shown in his expression, because Koujaku grinned at him. “Was I that good?” he said lightly,  _teasingly_. “That you even forgot how to speak Japanese?”

Embarrassment rolled in his gut, hot and uncomfortable, and Noiz glared at Koujaku, hoping that he didn’t show it. “Don’t act like you’re unaffected,” he growled, moving his hips again, reminding Koujaku of the erection currently pressing against him.

He felt Koujaku shudder slightly, but the grin didn’t diminish. “Ah, but I’m the one more in control here. You’re still thinking too much with your dick.”

There was an angry retort on the tip of Noiz’s tongue, but Koujaku leaned down and pressed his lips to the corner of Noiz’s mouth in a light,  _affectionate_ peck that startled Noiz enough to make him swallow back his words.

The grin had softened into a smile. “Let’s not skip to the sex immediately, all right?” Koujaku asked, eyes twinkling. “I’d rather take things a bit more slowly.”

Noiz narrowed his eyes, a little displeased at the idea, but he let his lips curve in a taunting smirk. “ _Slow?_ You just can’t keep up me and didn’t want to admit it, old man.”

“And we’re back to the insults. You really should learn to respect your elders, brat.” His face grew solemn. “Look, Noiz, we may have shared some…important things about each other, but the fact is, I don’t actually _know_  you, and I’m not entirely comfortable with that. Call it old-fashioned, if you think so, but I want to treat you better, okay? I want to do this _right._ ”  

For a long moment Noiz could only stare at Koujaku, meeting Koujaku’s earnest gaze with a blank one of his own. _Is this guy for real? How could he say something so…cheesy with a straight, serious face?_

“You sound like a character from some romance drama,” Noiz said aloud, and saw Koujaku’s eye twitch in reaction.

“Oi, I’m trying to be serious here—”

“Whatever. I’ll let you do it your way.”

“—the least you could do is lis…huh?” Koujaku broke off. “What did you just say?”

“I’ll let you do it your way,” Noiz repeated, smiling at the slack-jawed expression Koujaku wore. “What, did you think I was going to fight with you over something like that? It doesn’t really matter much, in the end. At least we both know what to expect.” He shrugged off Koujaku’s hands, and walked back into Aoba’s room.

He could hear Koujaku mutter something that sounded like “I never know what to expect with you” under his breath before stomping in Noiz’s wake, and Noiz couldn’t help but grin. It really was too easy to throw Koujaku off-balance, and it never stopped being funny.

He snapped his fingers at Usagimodoki, and the bunny cube obediently hopped over into his waiting palm with a beep. “Well, I’m leaving,” he said, glancing over his shoulder at Koujaku.

“Huh?” Koujaku had paused just inside the threshold between balcony and Aoba’s room proper, surprise flickering over his face before turning into annoyance. “Wait just a minute, you’re leaving _now?_ What about Aoba?”

“You’re here, aren’t you?” Noiz pointed out. “There’s nothing else for me to do here, and unlike you, I have my own life that _doesn’t_ revolve around protecting Aoba.” Laughing at the outraged spluttering his remark caused, Noiz walked out of the room, pausing just enough to blow a mocking kiss before slamming the sliding door closed on Koujaku’s stunned expression.

Way too easy.

 _Although I suppose that was just part of Koujaku’s charm_ , Noiz mused as he made his way back to his apartment, idly tossing Usagimodoki’s cube up and down in his hand. That predictability also made him reliable. _Safe._ For all of the secrets that Koujaku hid away, a lot of what you see was what you get.

What was a lot less charming was Koujaku’s insistence on “doing things right”.

It made sense, if you were a traditional old fart, which was basically what Koujaku was. Noiz was no stranger to the courtship game; he had all the necessary protocols and methods drilled into his head from a very young age, even if he had not actually put them into practice. He never really understood the _point_ of it before, and he still didn’t quite get it now. If you like them, you like them, as far as he was concerned. It was just more efficient to lay all of one’s cards on the table, so to speak, instead of relying on things like sending the right kind of flowers to get the message across.

An image popped into his head of him presenting a bouquet of roses to Koujaku, and watching Koujaku stammer and blush in response to it.

_…Hmm._

All right, maybe Noiz can see the appeal of it.

Still, that left one rather glaring problem.

He had no doubt that Koujaku could and would take things slowly. However, Noiz wasn’t sure about his own restraint.

When Koujaku had spoken so earnestly to him about wanting to treat Noiz better, it took all of Noiz’s self-control to not push him down to the floor and just blow him right there. It was probably a perverse thing, but something about Koujaku’s strict adherence to _propriety_ made Noiz want to find ways to take that oh-so-smooth image apart and turn Koujaku into a writhing, needy mess.

But giving in to his impulses this early would only ruin things. Noiz didn’t give a flying fuck about what other people thought of him, but he knew how Koujaku had a weird _thing_ about image, based on how carefully he had built this aesthetic façade of some traditional Japanese warrior-type figure. Koujaku probably wouldn’t appreciate being jumped on and climbed like a tree before he was ready, which Noiz probably would do eventually if he hung around the old man too long. And even while Noiz made fun of them, he truly wanted to respect Koujaku’s wishes. That meant Noiz had to find a way to put some distance between them, if only for his own sanity’s sake.

But how could Noiz accomplish that without giving the impression that he was completely abandoning Koujaku?

Noiz pondered this during his meandering walk to his place, running multiple scenarios through his head and discarding one after another for various reasons. It wasn’t until he had locked the front door behind him that a rather unusual idea occurred to him.

It could work, theoretically.  It also had the side benefit of giving Noiz something to do with his free time, since he had no real incentive to participate in Rhyme after he had regained his ability to feel things, and he doubted Toue Inc. would last long after the destruction of Platinum Jail, which meant Rhyme battles will go back to the disorganised mess it was in its early years until other companies started regulating it.

But it meant that Noiz would have to confront some extremely unpleasant memories, and he honestly wasn’t sure if he was ready to deal with _that_ particular brand of pain.

Noiz rolled the idea around in his mind for a little while longer, weighing the pros and cons, before letting out a mental sigh of irritation.

It was a gamble, either way, with no sure way of predicting the outcome. Noiz _hated_ gambling.

But Noiz was doing this for Koujaku’s sake, and if there was the slightest chance of making Koujaku happy, Noiz was willing to do anything to make that happen.  

Smiling, feeling suddenly light-hearted despite the sheer _crazy_ of what he was about to do, he tossed the cube up so it could hover in front of his face. “Usagimodoki, wake up.”

“Pi!” The cube bobbed and spun around him. “Awake! Awake! Awaiting instructions, pi!”

“Check if my passport is still valid. If not, renew it. And pull up some flight schedules of the more reputable airlines that travel out of Midorijima.”

“Roger! Are we going on vacation?”

Noiz raised his eyebrows at the excited spinning Usagimodoki was doing. “Don’t act so eager. This is more of a work obligation than something for fun.”

“But we’re going travelling, yes? Pi! How exciting! Noiz, Noiz, where are we going? Pi!”

“Germany.”

**Author's Note:**

> So...Noiz's PoV is a little strange, because my headcanon of him has the emotional maturity of a teenager falling in love for the first time, the cynicism of a jaded adult, the too-quick-thinking of a genius, and the kind of haughty super-privileged attitude and unintentional ignorance that those born into old money sometimes get.
> 
> In other words, a haphazard mess that should not work together but I have to make them work. xD


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